He could have done no better had he foreseen every
stage of his coming life, and he would probably have done worse.
The preliminary step was pure gain. James Russell Lowell had
brought back from Germany the only new and valuable part of its
universities, the habit of allowing students to read with him
privately in his study. Adams asked the privilege, and used it to
read a little, and to talk a great deal, for the personal contact
pleased and flattered him, as that of older men ought to flatter
and please the young even when they altogether exaggerate its
value. Lowell was a new element in the boy's life. As practical a
New Englander as any, he leaned towards the Concord faith rather
than towards Boston where he properly belonged; for Concord, in
the dark days of 1856, glowed with pure light. Adams approached
it in much the same spirit as he would have entered a Gothic
Cathedral, for he well knew that the priests regarded him as only
a worm. To the Concord Church all Adamses were minds of dust and
emptiness, devoid of feeling, poetry or imagination; little
higher than the common scourings of State Street; politicians of
doubtful honesty; natures of narrow scope; and already, at
eighteen years old, Henry had begun to feel uncertainty about so
many matters more important than Adamses that his mind rebelled
against no discipline merely personal, and he was ready to admit
his unworthiness if only he might penetrate the shrine.
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